Project helps raise genocide awareness

One million.

It's a difficult number for many to comprehend. But some Southampton eighth-graders are figuring it out by participating in the One Million Bones project, which focuses attention on the millions of people killed in genocides past and present.

The project allows teachers, like Melissa Mitchell at Southampton Intermediate School, to incorporate state curriculum into a hands-on project that includes literature, social awareness and historical events, as well as art.

The 22 students in Mitchell's English Language Arts class have spent the better part of two months learning about the Holocaust -- which during World War II resulted in the extermination of 6 million European Jews -- and other genocides, including those in Rwanda, where 800,000 Tutsis were killed by Hutus in the small African nation in 1994, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, an ongoing civil war that has taken the lives of at least 5.4 million civilians from various armed groups.

Now, Mitchell's students are making the bones in class to represent those lost. The goal is to make 2,500 bones, with the help of all the school's eighth-graders and the community, Mitchell said.

The One Million Bones project is based in Albuquerque, N.M., and is the brainchild of artist Naomi Natale, who spearheaded a similar exhibit in 2006 called the Cradles Project, for children orphaned by AIDS. This time, Natale focused on victims of genocide, and hopes to have 1 million bones made of clay, wood and other materials to represent the millions of genocide victims, and exhibit on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., next spring. There has been an exhibit of 50,000 bones in Albuquerque, and one is under way in New Orleans. A similar exhibit will take place next month in Albany.

The Southampton students plan to hold their exhibit at the Water Mill Center before the bones are sent to Washington, D.C. No date has been set for the local exhibit.

As part of the English Language Arts curriculum, Mitchell's students have read books on the Holocaust and other genocides, including "The Sunflower" by Simon Wiesenthal and Lois Lowry's "Number the Stars." They have also created a timeline of known genocides that hangs on the classroom wall along with names of victims they found through research.

"I thought the Holocaust was a one-time thing," said Valentina Kobler, 13. "That one man did something crazy."

But this project has made her and the other students realize that genocide still exists.

The project also allows students to look closer to home by connecting genocides to bullying. "It's the fault of the bully, but it's also our fault," said Conor Gill, 13. "We didn't do anything to stop it."

Mitchell said the goal of 2,500 bones can be reached with help from the community. The students also want to hear from genocide survivors, or relatives, and plan to reach out to local community groups to help them make bones and submit names of victims or survivors.

Some sixth-graders at Jericho Middle School, the only other Long Island school involved in the national project, made 30 wooden bones.

"They are using their hands to create these bones, and to send a message beyond their own community," said Matthew Silva, a technology teacher at the middle school. "They loved it."